Aspen East London’s manufacturing plant required an increase in manufacturing capacity for their HVL department. They currently have 3 manufacturing cubicles which in turn supply 9 storage tanks and 3 filling lines.
They requested Anderson to add an additional manufacturing vessel with all required ancillary components to form a complete new manufacturing cubicle.
The scope of work included;
- 1 x New 5000L Manufacturing vessel
- Pumps, valves, instruments and Pipework
- 1 x New Andstrom High Shear Inline Blender
- Electrical and Control
- Installation and Commissioning
The project involved decommissioning 2 of the LDM cubicles to make space for the new B25 Vessel manufacturing cubicle. This was done prior to starting the installation of the new vessel and commenced in October 2020.
Pipework linking CIP and services commenced in October to allow the site team to move ahead on the overall project deliverables. This involved approximately 200m of pipework being run in the ceiling.
Due to the limited space available the vessel was custom designed to suite the room space requirements. Rigging of the vessel involved removing the legs and fitting them on site. The mixer and vessel alcove was also fitted in situ due to the very tight space available.
Installation work proved extremely challenging and time consuming to the work needing to be done while production continued. This involved our team having to access the cubicle via ladders through the ceiling.
This plant utilized the latest technology in terms of valve and instrument control. All valves utilized ASI bus communication with in digital feedback on all valves both product and service.
All instruments were wired using an IO link based smart wiring solution, this allowed for our electrical team to shorten overall time spent wiring cables and resulted in a neater and more concise installation.
The Andstrom blender used a pressure indicator controller to ensure that at any given time the powder introduction was done at the correct vacuum setpoint. This was a major improvement from the previous Andstrom installations.
Tie ins to Suagr and Sorbitol services was another challenge as we had 2 days over a weekend to complete this. With assistance from Mr Sudhir Debideen who has done numerous installations for Aspen we executed the tie ins and CIP of the lines within the time allocated and as per the request from Mike Reed (Project Manager) “we need to be in and out the plant like Ghosts.”
The plant was installed and commissioned in 2 phases due to the second wave of Covid in SA putting a hold to our resumption at the beginning of 2021.
In saying this we executed the project within Aspen’s time and ensured that all operational qualifications and validation was completed prior to our team leaving site.
The project was awarded in 2 phases. The vessel was first with the ancillary items after. It commenced in July 2020 with the overall project duration taking 22 weeks. Installation and commissioning started in November 2020 and was completed in February 2021 (2 months off-site due to Covid) The plant was tested and commissioned successfully with all functions tested and signed off. Formal product trials are on hold due to HVAC qualification. These are scheduled for later this year.
